The Marshall government has been a huge disappointment, Marshall himself looking permanently confused. After 16 years of Labor, South Australians were relieved to see a change. A change was needed - just not this change, as nothing good or useful has come of it. We've just had three corrupt ministers exposed, and Marshall defended them in the face of public outrage. All a genuine mistake, he said. He didn't sack them; he 'accepted their resignations'.

You can't move around Adelaide for 'roadworks' most of which don't refer to actual roads but to pottering around with footpaths. Signs get left long after any 'work' has finished: left by useless, costly make-work companies who have taken over from actual workers who used to be responsible for their own signs.

The media? Nothing to see there. Arson. Car crashes,and some old lady telling us she ha s reached 100 years age probably because she eats half a banana a day.

As a conservative, I will not vote for the Liberal party, which, like its federal counterpart is NOT conservative (nobody knows what it is), but for the sitting Labor member who gets things done for her electorate despite the wishy-washy government.

I wonder how many blackouts this summer? The Government 'experts' must be totally fooled. Plenty of billionares and China done so well out of the gw scam.

The Advertiser, good for wrapping fish and chips and that's it

The economy s in a mess everywhere, yet you somehow see that as game over for SA?
NO! It's nearly thirty years since we fell for the lie that the state's debt was what was holding its economy back. WE WON'T BE FOOLED AGAIN!

Don't get me wrong - the state's economy certainly does have problems unrelated to COVID. Some stem from federal factors (like the RBA setting interest rates too high for the SA economy's needs) but SA doe have many problems of its own making too.

The brain drain is the effect, not the cause, of the problems. And nor do we have a "sheltered workshop economy". Those days are long gone, and it's quite surprising that you hadn't noticed.

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kirby483, I've never actually seen fish and chips wrapped in the 'Tiser. Are you sure it's good for that?

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runner,
Experts are "fooled" by the facts into believing the truth instead of relying on their prejudices. It's such a pity the same can't be said about you!
BTW investment in big batteries has ensured SA now has a very reliable electricity supply. However, as with other states, localised blackouts still sometimes occur due to faults in the distribution system.

runner,

I was heartened to see that investment in renewable energy is falling away because things aren't happening fast enough for the money grubbers.

Yep a totally failed state.

If they couldn't bludge east coats water Queensland & NSW coal fired power, & Queensland & NSW GST money they would be sitting in the dark dying of thirst, & wondering if they could afford a can of beans for dinner.

Well thirty years or so of acting against the wishes of all but kooks crooks and conmen is working out exactly as it only could.
Looters have done ok.

Maybe the submarine building program - principally a car factory replacement Federal Government GRANT to South Australia

- should produce 24 submarines instead of only 12.

We don't have the captains or crews to man the current 6, let alone 12, but who cares!

I'll go out on a limb here. Those subs will never get built. They're due to get wet around 2035. Obsolete before they hit the water.

Malcolm,

Common sense says you are right; but, when did common sense interfere with political shenanigans?

We talking about the Malcolm class subs?

I'm from SA originally but I won't go back there to live. Marshall is cock-a-hoop over their wind and solar but fails to mention that 47% of their internal electricity generation is from dwindling gas supplies. Meanwhile Olympic Dam currently the world's second most productive uranium mine generates about 200 Twh of clean electricity overseas while SA uses a gas tainted 12 Twh per year.

SA's sense of entitlement knows no bounds. They sooled a commission onto upstream MDB water users while last summer the lower Murray lakes lost an estimated 1,000 GL from seepage and evaporation. That was enabled by the manmade locks from the sea. Now with that under their belts they want to pump freshwater to the salty lagoon called the Coorong. Too bad about upstream water users losing their livelihoods. SA needs to get real about a few things.

When the energy bill is higher than the wages bill!? Companies will as they must, offshore to survive!

S.A. had a chance to go nuclear and become a repository for the world's stockpile of nuclear waste! But whimped, caved in to ill-informed political pressure, then lost the election anyway!

And those that've replaced them, less emboldened or independent!

Might need someone to hold their hand as they cross the road? Would describe the political timidity that exists there and further up the political food chain?

There's no other real choice in a carbon contrained future, if you want to address climate change and keep a manufcturing industry, than the nuclear option. Those that claim you cannot do that with absolutely assured safety are talking out of their backsides and with a level of ignorance that has to been seen to be believed!

Yet have held successive governments to ransom with their activism only available to them via our preferential voting and a compulsory voting system. Were it optional, these minor players would have no such tail wagging the dog power! And the most popular candidates would get the gurnsey!

Albeit, not liked by the backroom power brokers! Given their power would be vastly diminished!

We need to go nuclear and to optional preferential or to proportional representation. Then we need to crack on with the nuclear option as the MSR SMR's option! Thorium and NW!

Then to a very big project like a dual-lane shipping canal that keeps Lake Erye permanently full, and dotted with new space age desal that's cost-effective for broad-scale agriculture!

After that, the Celtic economic miracle and the myriad co-ops that it created in the highly successful initial phase, would be a good template to build on, always providing, you do not repeat their only mistake of allowing debt-laden foreigners to take positions in the real estate market!
Alan B.

Taswegian,
If you're originally from SA, surely you know that SA has for decades been much more reliant on gas for electricity generation than the other states. Yet despite SA doing away with coal fired power, the proportion from gas has fallen below 50% and continues to diminish. Meanwhile we have gas supply security (with a pipeline from Victoria supplementing one from our main source in SA's north east).

Nuclear power does not make economic sense in SA at the moment. With hindsight it may have made economic sense in the noughties, as the very high gas prices since then sent our electricity prices sky high. But gas prices now seem to be on their way back down, and as I said, the proportion of electricity we generate from gas is rapidly falling.

The barrages were constructed with the agreement of the upstream states, but before that the flow of the river ensured that the Lower Lakes were a predominantly freshwater ecosystem. Since then the upstream states have taken much more water for irrigation, and generally irrigated in a less efficient way than SA has.

And yes, we should pump water into the Coorong; not from the Murray, but from Kingston.

I'm not saying SA's management of the Murray is perfect. But the way you;re spinning the issue bears very little resemblance to the truth.

Aidan you might note the Moomba-Adelaide gas pipe was built in 1969 half a century ago. The SEAGas pipe goes to Victoria but that state is looking at an LNG import terminal at Geelong and BHP is getting out of Bass gas. Since the UK and other places need nearly 40% gas fired electricity I'd say that's where SA will get stuck but with higher gas prices. The call for nuclear will get louder by 2030.

The lower lakes are kept artificially fresh by the 1930s built barrages. If sea level rise is as much as they say the sea will overtop them eventually and the Coorong lagoon will merge with the ocean. SA should see the writing on the wall and open the barrages now

Aidan one of these days you may make a statement that is either true, factual, & even balanced.

Please never make a statement that is all three similtaneously, as many of us would pass out with the shock, & could be injured.

The short version of this article is that it is an argument against democracy :) Apparently the author has a long laundry list of people to blame EXCEPT the voters. Voting has consequences, and here we are. At this stage if you're voting Labour or LNP, you're part of the problem by entrenching this travesty

Reading "Can Life Prevail?" by Pentti Linkola (a Finnish eco conservationist) and I think he is on to something. Teh difference ? He just explicitly blames democracy.

https://www.booktopia.com.au/can-life-prevail--pentti-linkola/book/9781907166631.html

Taswegian, I might note trivia but I probably won't. Do you think the age of the Moomba-Adelaide gas pipeline is a problem? If so, why?
I'm aware of the plans for a gas import terminal near Geelong, but IMO it will never be built, as it's cheaper just to pay export customers to get their gas from somewhere else.

Bass gas will continue to be exploited; whether or not BHP is involved is of little consequence, though it may be an indicator that they believe the era of very high gas prices is over

Your comment about the UK is a non sequiter. The amount of gas the UK uses is not constant, and is currently fairly high because they've almost ended their reliance on coal. As they construct more solar and wind power infrastructure, expect to see their figure fall. Anyway, it's irrelevant to SA, which is a lot sunnier than the UK. There's no credible obstacle to getting the figure in SA much lower than 40%.

And if anything, rising sea levels are a good reason NOT to get rid of the barrages, but are a reason to raise them so they don't get overtopped.

Valley Guy,
No such thing as LNP in SA. The Nats are relatively insignificant, and have previously been in coalition with Labor.

Nick Xenohon's party would probably have been a much better alternative for SA than Labor or Liberal, but he made three enormous blunders in his election campaign:
• He didn't effectively communicate his party's policies.
• Instead he ran a political jingle, oblivious to how much Croweaters loathe those because of Labor's Gilligan's Island ad in the late '90s.
• He didn't run candidates in all seats.

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Hasbeen, don't worry - whenever I make a statement that's true, you're likely to assume it to be false because it contradicts what you think you know. Whenever I make a statement that's factual, you assume I've invented it. And you're so unbalanced that you'd never recognise any of my statements as balanced because they fail to give your lunatic fringe views due consideration!

Hi Aidan

I'd be careful.

Calling Hasbeen a lunatic is likely to offend decent lunatics.

Maybe an idiot in search of a village?

plantagenet,
I did not call Hasbeen a lunatic.
Saying someone has lunatic fringe views does not imply they're actually a lunatic.

With respect Aiden- My understanding is Nick Xenohon is a big supporter of the Education Industry in SA.

At least Marshall comes from a British Adelaide family though perhaps not from the in-crowd- this means that at least SA is represented by someone that appears to have strong Adelaide roots. Adelaide politicians have protected heritage in a way that few states have managed to achieve- with some notable exceptions.

The "Malcolm King" article appears to be broadly saying that "change is good" on this I strongly disagree. Maybe this is a way of getting a Liberal Politician to baiting proof of his credentials as being pro-business at the expense of the Adelaide community. I guess small L liberals don't value community.

I'd hate to see large developers get the green light to hack the cultural heart and soul out of the city like has been "achieved" in so many other Australian cities. To an extend the megalith of the Education Industry has probably already done significant damage there and their young are more vulnerable to large changes in the labour market and immigration impacts than other places.

The Murray River issue is a long standing issue with SA, NSW and VIC. Not sure how they deal with this issue in other places.

One of the questions I would be asking if Malcolm King really wanted to help SA is "why don't the SA people act in support of certain policies"- as ex-World Bank Economist Joseph Stiglitz says- because they don't see it as in their self interest- then Malcolm King comes along and bullies them and says they are stupid so they will do what he wants. There are words for people like that.

Perhaps Malcolm King is just another developers astro-turf shill that makes a mess and then leaves and families that have lived there for generations have to live with the nuclear fallout.

A bit of anti-Murdoch (Advertiser) propaganda thrown in. Notably Rupert Murdoch probably has much more of a touchstone to Adelaide than many